[tmottabr]

But what is being discussed is social media current incarnation and that is exactly what i talking about. I even kind address your point when i said that it evolved\merge into forums, that were themselves an evolution of bulletin boards that in turn were evolution of older concepts.

But i don't see BBS or forums really as a digital public square anymore then current social media is. They were really silos were you would find people with similar interest, but was ultimately subjected to the will of the board owner or its moderators.

I see those more as an digital version of clubs then a public square.

Also the modern social media version of hobbyist forums\bulletin boards was also a short lived one and has being replaced by the addictive algorithm aimed at capturing our attention as much as possible that we have today.

I do not see anything in the past that could resemble what we have today, the closet parallel would be addictive drugs.

Surely some of the old community building aspects are still there in some platforms, but the biggest problem is that now we are seen a new generation of platforms being born from start aimed at the single goal of capturing our attention and get us hooked.